


Leaves From the Vine

by geeksoup



Category: Dishonored (Video Games)
Genre: Alternate Universe - Canon Divergence, Body Horror, Brigmore Witch!Daud, Canon-Typical Violence, Death of the Outsider rewrite, Eye Trauma, Gen, Healing from trauma
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2020-09-06
Updated: 2020-09-10
Packaged: 2021-03-06 23:33:06
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Graphic Depictions Of Violence
Chapters: 2
Words: 2,357
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/26327176
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/geeksoup/pseuds/geeksoup
Summary: Reunited with her mentor after fifteen years, Billie Lurk finds herself hunting for a curse's cure, an artifact that could end the world as she knows it, and an ever-watching god.---I finished Dishonored: Death of the Outsider and had my own ideas about how it could have gone. Welcome to my rewrite!
Kudos: 13





	1. Chapter 1

**Author's Note:**

> Thank you to my friend and beta reader Vivs for coming up with the title!

Getting in had been easy. No one suspected anything about a stranger coming into the Albarca Baths to watch the nightly fights in the Eyeless’s club. The Dockyards were dirty and the Baths were just as grimy on the inside and out, and the people hanging around the club seemed just as nasty. The tiled floor shone dull under the electric lights and echoed every sound. Billie had bought a drink early in the evening and sauntered up to the betting desk to listen in on The Eyeless’s conversations. They all casually discussed the horrible deaths of other fighters at the hands of their beloved Brute while Billie listened in disgusted silence. When she’d heard enough, she slipped away through an unlocked door and snatched a key away from the club’s owner. Billie had a feeling that getting out of the Baths would be just as easy.

Downstairs again, Billie looked down into the cage where the Brute was being held. Her breath caught in her throat. She’d never seen Daud so pale, so _old_. Whatever the suppression field was doing had clearly taken a toll on his health. But, even as Billie unlocked the switch casing and turned the field off, she felt arcane power emanating from him. In one blink Daud stood from the chair, and in another, everyone in the Baths cried out and fell limp to the floor. Daud stood silently in the center of the bodies, breathing hard and clutching his chest. Billie took a cautious step towards him. “Daud…” she rasped, her eyes widening as she fully took in the old man in front of her.

Daud’s hair had grayed so much that it was pure white, and the wrinkles on his face had become deeper with time. His clothes were torn and stained with blood from past fights, and probably smelled just as bad. His shoulders sagged and dark circles from lack of sleep ringed his eyes like bruises. He looked like he should be dead.

Daud tried to take a step forward but groaned in pain, and as he moved Billie caught sight of a flash of color on his clothes. She looked closer and saw that vines of ivy and clumps of orange flowers sprung thick from Daud’s chest. Foliage poked out from his collar and grew up over his clothing. The vines continued to wind like a vise around his neck and jaw, reaching as far as the start of his scar. Billie had felt the energy that surrounded Daud before, fifteen years ago. The Brigmore Witches’ magic had deep penetrating roots, invasive and parasitic. It had seduced her, but how had it seduced Daud?

“I know what you’re thinking,” Daud said, not looking at Billie. She noticed his shoulders were sagging and he seemed unsteady on his feet. “After I went to the mansion, they—” He cut himself off with a coughing fit that made Billie wince and quickly guide him to the benches by the wall. Daud sat gratefully and fiddled with one of his vines’ leaves. He coughed more, but not as hard as before, while Billie dragged a chair over the sit across from him.

“Did the Eyeless do this to you?” she asked, jerking her thumb at the bodies on the floor. A witch that’d been part of Delilah’s old coven had been guarding the bar entrance, Billie recalled. Maybe Daud’s affliction was part of the suppression field?

Daud shook his head. “No. After I trapped Delilah in the Void, the remaining witches caught and cursed me,” he explained. He rolled his shoulders and scratched at the thick vine over the scar on his face. “Honestly, I think these Void-damned plants are only thing that’s been keeping me alive down here.”

Billie frowned and crossed her arms. “Delilah’s dead and her coven is completely powerless. Shouldn’t you be un-cursed?” she asked. Daud considered that for a moment, but smiled ruefully and laughed, the sound grating like torn metal.

“Doesn’t mean the bitch that cursed me is dead. Void magic has a mind of its own,” he said. Daud clenched his fist and blinked up above the scoreboard, next to a copy of Sokolov’s painting of The Outsider. His plant growth swayed gently with the movement. Billie turned to look up at him as he ran his fingers over the portrait’s golden frame.

“Do you have any idea of how we can reverse the curse, or at least…” Billie waved her hands around, searching for words. “Can we prune you? What does that do for it?”

Daud snorted and Billie swore she saw the old man smile briefly. “Trust me, I’ve tried. Hurts like a bloodfly sting. Also, I’ve got a job for you,” he said.

“Who’s the mark?” she asked.

“Not ‘who,’ it’s a ‘what.’ I’ve been doing some research and I’ve found an artifact that could ruin everything,” Daud explained. “It’s called the Twin-bladed Knife. Allegedly it can kill The Outsider, and these bastards have their hands on it. Imagine what could happen.” He gestured widely to the bodies in the room. Billie bit her lip. She couldn’t tell why Daud wanted to take the Knife-- his face wasn’t revealing much. Did he want to kill The Outsider, or prevent that from happening? He could also just be curious, but knowing Daud, Billie doubted that.

Unease nagged at the back of her mind, but if doing this job would prove to Daud she was still loyal to him—even after everything that had happened—she’d do it.

“Alright. I’ll help you find that Knife,” she said at length. Daud dug his fingers into the canvas of The Outsider’s portrait and ripped it from the frame as he blinked back to the floor. The god’s face distorted in bizarre waves with the curve of the limp canvas. Billie avoided looking at it for too long.

“You should head back to the boat, old man. There’s a carriage in the station past the apartments. I’ll join you in a bit—I’ve got some business in here I still need to finish,” Billie said.

Daud rolled his eyes. “Whatever you say,” he snarked, bending down to pick up an Eyeless’s fallen pistol before blinking away up the stairs leading out of the club. Billie grimaced. Daud’s tone likely meant he was still angry with Billie for her betrayal fifteen years ago. Did he blame her for the Brigmore curse as well? She knew it’d been over a decade since they spoke, but it still stung to think about.

She shook her head and unsheathed her knife. If he trusted her with this job in the first place, maybe they could make peace after all. But as Daud had taught her, you can never predict how someone will act once you’ve let them down.


	2. Chapter 2

On The Dreadful Wale, Billie scrubbed her gloves in the galley sink until the leather cracked. Her hands and clothes were covered in that disgusting rat-booze the Eyeless brewed, thanks to that contract she took, but at least she had some more cash on hand now. She was also a few bonecharms richer: these were handcrafted with boons of healing and strength, one of which she tucked into Daud’s coat pocket while he slept off a month of imprisonment and abuse.

The portrait of The Outsider glared at her from in the hold, and Billie glared right back as she passed it on her way to her cabin. She wished she hadn’t kept the spare frame from when Anton Sokolov was her passenger. The portrait gave her the creeps.

Daud was still sleeping. He’d been passed out on the spare cot when Billie returned to the ship, an open book resting on his chest. Most of the vines and flowers had concealed themselves, but one cluster of those strange orange blooms remained on Daud’s lapel. They didn’t smell sickly sweet like the Brigmore Witches’ roses did—the orange flowers barely had a scent as far as Billie could tell. The petals had ridges like the fins of a hagfish and were sturdier than roses. Billie wondered if the ivy and flowers had any magical properties, or if the curse chooses what grows in its host. She briefly touched a petal before pulling her hand away and leaving Daud to rest.

In her cabin, she shrugged her bandoliers off and laid her knife on her desk. Billie looked at Deidre’s sketch on her wall, posted alongside articles about Emily, Anton, and Aramis. Deidre’s kind eyes stared over Billie’s shoulder, fixated on the wall by her bed. Billie scooted her desk chair back and sat down, resting her head on her arms. “My sweet Deidre,” she said. “What would you say about all this?”

Deidre’s portrait did not respond. Billie reached into her pocket and pulled out the carved heart Deidre gave her and ran her thumb across the swirling motifs covering its surface. With the heart’s magic she could hear the rats in the engine room whispering and scurrying along the pipes. Billie closed her eyes and listened to her ship to try and calm her racing mind.

The Dreadful Wale was her pride and joy. Ever since she was a little girl, Billie wanted to be the captain of her own ship. The Wale was just big enough for her and a few passengers, and she’s fixed it up nicely from the sorry state she’d bought it in. Though, despite this dream-come-true, she’d been finding less and less happiness from sailing recently. Keeping a ship was a chore, yes, but she’d been having to force herself to leave her cabin ever since she dropped Anton off in Tyvia two months ago.

Suddenly, the air shifted and everything around her froze. She heard the distinct shattering sound of someone blinking into her cabin and she reached for her knife. Billie wheeled around to face the intruder, swinging the blunt edge of her knife towards the figure sitting on her cot.

The Outsider lifted his hand and caught hold of the knife blade. “The waters are calm today, Billie Lurk.” the deity greeted. The tight-lipped smile he wore didn’t match his stony glare that bored into Billie’s soul. “The ocean and those who traverse it are so similar, don’t you think? One minute the sea is flat and easy, then turns raging and—”

“ _You_ ,” Billie spat. She yanked her knife away from The Outsider, still keeping its tip aimed at him. “What do you want from me?” It seemed all too coincidental that The Outsider would appear now, just after Daud spoke about the Knife. Billie returned the god’s glare with twice the intensity as he blinked up at her.

The Outsider’s eyebrows raised in shock that Billie had interrupted him, but he quickly composed himself and began pacing around her cabin. He said nothing until he disappeared in a swirl of Void-rock, then reappeared in front of Billie and grasped her arm. “What in the Void—” Billie gasped, struggling against The Outsider’s vise-like grip.

“Most people want something from _me,_ but you don’t want my usual gifts, do you, Billie Lurk? Curious, seeing that you’ve missed using the Arcane Bond these long years,” the deity said. Billie scrunched up her nose in confusion at the sadness in The Outsider’s voice, but her attention quickly turned to the searing pain in her right arm. Void magic twisted thick around her flesh and burned like hot oil. “Hey—wait! What are you—” Billie shouted, cutting herself off with a cry of pain as The Outsider shoved something hard and freezing cold onto her face.

Billie stumbled backwards against her desk and clawed at the cold thing over her eye. The Outsider watched patiently as she gaped at the shattered, corpse-like thing her arm had become. She was acutely aware of her veins and tendons pulling against bone as she clenched her right fist. She lunged at The Outsider, who merely disappeared and rematerialized behind her. “You will never be the same, Billie Lurk. Such change would’ve happened to you even without my help. I’ll be eagerly watching for your next move,” he said with a sharp-toothed grin.

Time resumed and The Outsider vanished back into the Void. Billie stared at where the whale god had stood, chest heaving as her arm and eye prickled and seared. She caught her reflection in the dark glass of her lantern and saw her eye had been replaced with a black stone that glowed blood red in the center. Her fingers ghosted over the stone’s jagged surface, feeling the skin around the edges. The stone had cut her above her eyebrow when The Outsider forced it onto her face, and she could feel a thin trickle of blood following the slope of her nose. She didn’t want to study her “new” arm too closely; when she moved it she could hear bone clacking together.

“Billie? What happened?” Daud’s muffled voice called from in the hold.

Billie opened her cabin’s door to find Daud sagging against the wall, frowning at her. “Did you feel him? The Outsider?” Billie asked. Her right arm twitched and she clamped her other hand down on the remaining flesh. She took a few steps towards Daud, but stopped short before she could reach out to him.

Daud nodded. “Yeah, I felt him come through. Didn’t see him, but—” His eyes fell on her ruined arm and eye. “Billie…” Daud rasped.

Billie shook her head and set her jaw. “Nothing I can’t handle. At least I can still see and use this,” she replied, wiggling the dry fingers of her right arm. Daud huffed out a laugh and a ghost of a smile flickered on his face. “Of course, of course,” he said. He used the wall to help turn himself around and limped back over to his cot. Billie followed him into the hold to see that he got settled, and to grab something to eat. She glared at The Outsider’s portrait again as she passed it. This time when she looked closer, it felt like the painting was smiling devilishly back at her.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> This is a bit early for an update, but this chapter is the second part of the introduction. I hope you enjoyed it! As always, feel free to leave a comment and kudos <3

**Author's Note:**

> Thank you for reading! I'm excited to get this into full swing. Feel free to leave a comment and kudos, it's always great to know what you guys think.


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